There are two different versions of the story of the end of the Cold War: the Russian version, and the truth. President Barack Obama endorsed the Russian version in Moscow last week.

Speaking to a group of students, our president explained it this way: “The American and Soviet armies were still massed in Europe, trained and ready to fight. The ideological trenches of the last century were roughly in place. Competition in everything from astrophysics to athletics was treated as a zero-sum game. If one person won, then the other person had to lose. And then within a few short years, the world as it was ceased to be. Make no mistake: This change did not come from any one nation. The Cold War reached a conclusion because of the actions of many nations over many years, and because the people of Russia and Eastern Europe stood up and decided that its end would be peaceful.”

The truth, of course, is that the Soviets ran a brutal, authoritarian regime. The KGB killed their opponents or dragged them off to the Gulag. There was no free press, no freedom of speech, no freedom of worship, no freedom of any kind. The basis of the Cold War was not “competition in astrophysics and athletics.” It was a global battle between tyranny and freedom. The Soviet “sphere of influence” was delineated by walls and barbed wire and tanks and secret police to prevent people from escaping. America was an unmatched force for good in the world during the Cold War. The Soviets were not. The Cold War ended not because the Soviets decided it should but because they were no match for the forces of freedom and the commitment of free nations to defend liberty and defeat Communism.

AMEN to that one, sister! More…

It is irresponsible for an American president to go to Moscow and tell a room full of young Russians less than the truth about how the Cold War ended.One wonders whether this was just an attempt to push “reset” — or maybe to curry favor. Perhaps, most concerning of all, Mr. Obama believes what he said.

Lynne Cheney on Obama’s anti-Americanism:

Mr. Obama’s method for pushing reset around the world is becoming clearer with each foreign trip. He proclaims moral equivalence between the U.S. and our adversaries, he readily accepts a false historical narrative, and he refuses to stand up against anti-American lies.

The approach was evident in his speech in Moscow and in his speech in Cairo last month. In Cairo, he asserted there was some sort of equivalence between American support for the 1953 coup in Iran and the evil that the Iranian mullahs have done in the world since 1979. On an earlier trip to Mexico City, the president listened to an extended anti-American screed by Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and then let the lies stand by responding only with, “I’m grateful that President Ortega did not blame me for the things that occurred when I was 3 months old.”

Asked at a NATO meeting in France in April whether he believed in American exceptionalism, the president said, “I believe in American Exceptionalism just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.” In other words, not so much.

and on Obama’s ego-centric view of his Presidency:

The Obama administration does seem to believe in another kind of exceptionalism — Obama exceptionalism. “We have the best brand on Earth: the Obama brand,” one Obama handler has said. What they don’t seem to realize is that once you’re president, your brand is America, and the American people expect you to defend us against lies, not embrace or ignore them. We also expect you to know your history.

Wow! — last week Sarah Palin called it plainly and correctly on Obama’s economic policy when she said it was immoral. From Palin’s TIME magazine interview:

President Obama is growing government outrageously, and it’s immoral and it’s uneconomic, his plan that he tries to sell America. His plan to “put America on the right track” economically, incurring the debt that our nation is incurring, trillions of dollars that we’re passing on to our kids, expecting them to pay off for us, is immoral and doesn’t even make economic sense. So his growth of government agenda needs to be ratcheted back………allow free enterprise and the industrious Americans who run our small businesses and want to raise a family, allowing our families to grow and prosper and thrive, Americans who still believe in those ideals to get in there and effect change. I want to work for people who believe in that

This week Lynne Cheney correct Obama’s history and slams his anti-American views.

Perhaps we are getting a clearer picture of the conservative movement of the near future …..and it’s wearing lipstick and heels!

6 Responses

The Soviets ran a brutal, totalitarian regime. The United States had veritable witch hunts during the McCarthy era.

The Soviet Union practically advertised its denigration of personal freedoms. The United States did the same behind closed doors to anyone who knew anything of communism beyond “it’s evil”.

The Soviet Union collapsed because Gorbachev was a reformer, and once he loosened the USSR’s grip on its citizens and the market, they both spiraled. Even more important, though, was the fact that after decades of nuclear arms construction, its economy imploded as a continued Cold War was financially unsustainable.

The only reason the United States didn’t suffer the same fate was because its pockets were slightly deeper. Another decade of business as usual would have witnessed similar economy collapse in the west. Reagan bankrupted the USSR by almost doing the same on the other side of the Atlantic.

You paint the US in this saintly, infallible light when that is not, nor has even been, the case. That’s what the politicians fed us back then, and that’s what they continue to feed us now. The cold reality is that it’s simply more economically viable to give citizens freedom.

I love this country, and its values, and on the whole it certainly has been a “good” for the world. But the those “good” deeds have rarely, IF EVER, been motivated by doing good for its own sake. They’ve been done because it’s been popular and, most importantly, economically favorable, to do so. Ease up on the US-does-no-wrong kool aid and recognize that there are more than two sides to the overall equation.

magsol,
Your “veritable witch hunts” comments attempts to force equivalence between the Russians killing any who opposed them and a moment in US history that happened to highlight the Communists among us….killing your opponents versus the controversy that ensued by interrogating US citizens is hardly equivalent. (and I agree we can debate the errors the US did or didn’t make during the so-called McCarthy-era, but the comparison is a huge stretch)

Of course, I’m sure from your “it’s evil” in quotes, insinuating that Communism isn’t evil, that you and those like you are more upset that Communism was targeted rather than any so-called freedoms that were violated by our government.

You certainy don’t seem to mind the full frontal assault on our freedoms that is happening in record speed under Obama and Democrat control.
Laughable.

Ronald Reagan won the Cold War and no amount of Leftist rewrite from you or Obama can change that.

It is remarkable that you would even come close to accusing Reagan of “bankrupting” our country when the very President you defend has quadrupled the deficit this year, unemployment has risen by 50% since Obama took office (he said would top out at 8%, it is at 9.5% and climbing), and the spending by this Congress and President is unprecedented. YOu obviously don’t want to see it, but the spending and debt is unsustainable and bankrupting our country.

In the years of Reagan presidency, Reagan reduced unemployment by half (about 10% down to 5%), he reduced inflation from about 13% to 5%, the stock market tripled in value during his tenure, and the tax burden on citizens was reduced from the 70% range down to 28%.– all while rebuilding our defenses and ending the Cold War.

And if you want to compare debt, the national debt when Reagan left office was 42% of GDP. Estimates from the CBO with Obama’s debt spending plans, the national debt over the next 10 years will sore to 82.4% – DOUBLE THAT OF REAGAN.
Obama’s budget also increases spending this year by 34% for a total of $4 Trillion budget….THE HIGHEST EVER!
And during Reagan’s defense build up to win the Cold War, total federal spending declined from a high of 23.5 percent of GDP in 1983 to 21.3 percent in 1988 and 21.2 percent in 1989.

Those facts of Reagan’s tenure present quite the opposite picture than that of “bankrupting” our nation.
Don’t let the facts get in the way of your claims.

I would challenge you to think about who your kids/grandkids would rather have had in office before they were born — Reagan or Obama. Those kids born during and after Reagan have enjoying unprecedented prosperity and safety as opposed to those in the coming years who will enjoy a massive DEBT burden they didn’t create and government control of their lives that is unconstitutional and unmatched in our country’s history…..not to mention the volatility around the world that is escalating due to Obama’s policy of coddling tyrants and dissing our allies.

You also said this
“The cold reality is that it’s simply more economically viable to give citizens freedom. I love this country, and its values, and on the whole it certainly has been a “good” for the world. But the those “good” deeds have rarely, IF EVER, been motivated by doing good for its own sake. They’ve been done because it’s been popular and, most importantly, economically favorable, to do so.”

I guess we all (except you) missed that part in the founder’s statements where they were only fighting for freedom because “it is simply more economical”. Your statement shows a gross ignorance in understanding the respect that many in our 233 year history have and have had in fighting for freedom here and across the globe. When economics and other issues are at play, many times they are national security issues and also worth fighting for. While I don’t claim our country is perfect or always has been, unlike you, I respect the concept of freedom and what our founders provided for us. Your cynical view is typical of the Left who don’t mind keeping abortion mills open for the “almighty dollar” nor record deficits to fuel the welfare state, but turn around and condemn actions by our country (ie Reagan in the Cold War and Bush in Iraq/Afghanistan) that open up freedom in places around the world and preserve it here at home.

If there is any koolaid drinking going on, the pitcher is in your hand.

I apologize for the direct accusations and provocative comments; I try to keep those out of my arguments.

I will also admit that you are absolutely correct with the figures regarding Reagan’s presidency. I neglected to do my research, and the only thing I can really fault Reagan for is the debt he left in his wake, which does indeed pale in comparison to Obama’s spending.

As an aside, my original point was that Obama’s spending, in my opinion, is a lesser evil than letting the market rebalance itself on its own. But we have already debated that point in the past.

From there:

Your “veritable witch hunts” comments attempts to force equivalence between the Russians killing any who opposed them and a moment in US history that happened to highlight the Communists among us

I was not attempting to force equivalents, I was simply highlighting one way in which the US was not an unequivocal force of good in the Cold War. We were guilty of crimes against our own set of ideals.

insinuating that Communism isn’t evil

Also a warping of my original comment. Communism in theory, in fact, is the perfect form of government. The problem is that there is no human alive who can ensure it runs as it’s supposed to; the Soviet Union was far more autocratic than communist. My comment was simply a jab at the single-minded hatred then (and, to an extent, now) for anything related to the word, not an implication of any amount of love on my part for it.

I guess we all (except you) missed that part in the founder’s statements where they were only fighting for freedom because “it is simply more economical”.

This country split from Great Britain because it was being unfairly taxed. Hard to be any more financially motivated than that.

While I don’t claim our country is perfect or always has been, unlike you, I respect the concept of freedom and what our founders provided for us. Your cynical view is typical of the Left

If I didn’t respect and believe in what this country espouses, I wouldn’t be taking the time to debate with you. I wouldn’t care one way or the other whether Republicans, Democrats, or Communists were in office. I wouldn’t support our troops, and I probably wouldn’t even count myself as a US citizen. I am cynical enough to realize when the ends, while ultimately in line with our ideals, are accomplished through means that ensure an improvement in the bottom line. But I am optimistic enough to keep doing my part to help make America a country that doesn’t revolve around the almighty dollar.

Most historians would disagree with BOTH versions. The Vatican had a very significant role in undermining the Communist dictatorship in the USSR. The arms race between the US and the USSR bankrupted them and they imploded, as a previous poster stated. That’s well documented. But the US is not a morally superior, and that is very important to keep in mind, too. The CIA was responsible for the rise and fall of many governments, and dictators, throughout the world during the Cold War, playing people like chess pieces. Leaders were killed, people slaughtered, and regimes set up with bloody coups. Perhaps it could be argued that the political philosophy had some ‘moral superiority’, but if we are strict and exact in the meaning of ‘moral’, then the US is anything but superior.